


Cloven

by Langerhan



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Aziraphale is Bad at Feelings (Good Omens), Crowley Has A Vulva (Good Omens), Crowley Hates the 14th Century (Good Omens), Dentistry, Hurt Crowley (Good Omens), Medical Procedures, Medieval Medicine, Other, Pining, Plague, Vagina Dentata
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:35:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29342169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Langerhan/pseuds/Langerhan
Summary: Crowley needs help in an unusual place. Aziraphale is happy to lend a hand.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 54
Collections: Clerical Omens





	Cloven

It didn't take thousands of years of accumulating knowledge, the ability to see beyond human dimensions, or the memory of meeting with some of the world's best medics to know more than the men of Pickworth. All it took was the ability to read – or, more specifically, the ability to read Latin. 

Aziraphale remembered enough Latin to get by. English, which was getting more popular by the month, was trickier; in forme of speche is chaunge, as dear Geoffrey said. Blinking meant opening his eyes to new words swarming in from the continent and new fashions in how to pronounce them. 

Pickworth's priest was all too glad to welcome a new brother and his extensive library of twelve whole books. 

The village had more houses than people, and they'd told Aziraphale to pick any one he fancied, though his choices had been limited somewhat by the various parts of architecture which had been reused and repurposed. The first cottage he'd looked at had been full of chickens. While their owner had kindly offered to move them into his own house, Aziraphale rather preferred his dwellings to have been consistently chicken-free. 

The house Aziraphale eventually chose had smelled of moss and damp earth. He'd made a big show of opening all the doors and lighting incense to reassure the neighbours that any lingering miasmas had been entirely dissipated. The fact the place now smelled like fond and comfortable memories of his favourite scriptorium was entirely serendipitous, and certainly not something a holy man such as himself would plan.

It had taken some time for the Pickworthers to warm up to him. It didn't help that while Aziraphale had moved the majority of his body northward, his tongue had insisted on staying in the capital. The treacherous thing was too sharp and too courtly to belong in a Lincolnshire mouth. Through some careful persuasion (assisted by a few children too young for chores who were eager to tell him when he was saying things _wrong, that's not how you say it_ ) he managed to rearrange sound so that it arrived at everyone's ears in precisely the manner they were expecting. 

People liked him more then. 

They trusted him. They brought their new priest meals and maladies, although the two rarely corresponded. Aziraphale sometimes missed the days when people brought their priest goat, fruit and cheese to thank him for his duties. He missed Mediterranean food. 

“There's a new man arrived this mornin',” the snotty little girl on Aziraphale's bench announced. Her mother had sent her in with a slightly mealy pear and a reluctant apology for the fact she'd managed to get a bead stuck up her nose again. “Guy said he maybe brought Death with him and now we're all going to die. If we do, you'll be really busy, because Guy said Father Petrus can't bury us all by himself.” 

“I'm sure between the two of us, we shall cope,” murmured Aziraphale. “Now blow.” 

The girl dutifully blew her nose into Aziraphale's handkerchief before continuing. “Guy said that last time someone brought Death here, our nan died, and our mam's sister died, not the one who fell in the river but the other one, and Gytha's baby died but then she had another baby that grew up to be Lettice, and,” she paused for dramatic effect and squinted upwards, “the priest died. Priests always die.” 

“And are given their Heavenly reward for their noble sacrifices,” Aziraphale replied. His handkerchief now contained one wooden bead and an utterly abysmal amount of snot. If there was any Heavenly reward to be had, he was certainly entitled to it. “I'll visit the new man after Nones. Now off you go, and _do_ stop seeing if you can fit things up there.” 

The girl swung her legs dutifully off his bench and toddled along. 

The new man didn't appear at Nones, which was no surprise. The idea of a service for the hour the human soul was most prone to temptation was thwarted by the fact those most likely to turn up were least likely to succumb. In any case, it was Aziraphale's experience and opinion that if they really wanted to get souls into the church that would otherwise be straying, the hour they should have been using was Watch. Unfortunately, a nightclothes service would be as unpopular with young couples who used the time to start their families as with the priest who used the time to polish the church brass. 

The new man appeared at dusk. 

Aziraphale heard him before he saw him. It was rare for people to visit at this hour. During the daytime, there were accidents and illnesses. The only ones he'd get called for in the dark were emergencies. Dusk was a different space to either of them and the sound of someone dragging a chair over the rough floor put Aziraphale on edge. 

“So this is what you left Mile End for? Some poxy little town where you can wipe kids' noses and sew up workers' cuts?” 

They'd both been at Mile End before the whole thing ended badly. It had been far more Crowley's scene than Aziraphale's. Already chroniclers were writing histories about it which would've incensed Crowley if he'd spent any time reading. 

“Crowley. What are you doing here?” 

Crowley frowned. “Is that any way to greet your dearest nemesis? I heard about a travelling priest who was going around setting up infirmaries in Northumbria. Only here's the funny bit – he actually cures people.” 

Aziraphale sat down. It felt like a sitting down sort of conversation. “Curing people is exactly what infirmaries do. That's hardly unusual.”

“No, curing people is what infirmaries _claim_ to do, and anyone they can't cure was obviously incurable. They just give people a bed and tell them to sleep it off. Half the time it works, I'll give them that, but the other half people are expected to just keep limping along. Or die. Dying is the other possibility. Whereas this priest – he _actually_ cures people.” 

“And you thought you would provide some demonic interruption?” 

“I thought, I bet I know what idiot's doing that.” 

The words didn't sting as much as Crowley had probably intended. Even behind his glasses, he had a truth written across his face which matched the sentence inscribed in lemon juice across Aziraphale's soul. 

It read: Earth is much better with you here and I don't want you to leave it. 

“Congratulations. You found the idiot. Something to eat? I've got some pears around.” 

“Nah,” Crowley grinned, “just thought I'd stop by. So that when the parishioners bend your ear about seeing a devil in the woods, you know they're not lying.” 

Aziraphale tutted. Crowley leant back in his chair. Aziraphale fetched some ale. Crowley fetched some cups. 

The devil in the woods turned out to be keener on people's hearths, preferably drinking and throwing dice, than on any sort of natural setting. He never pressed his luck with anyone in the household (or at least, not in any sort of way that would get him into trouble with an angry parent or spouse), and according to Aziraphale's patients he mostly just wanted to spread the word of the Church in a way that was slightly treasonous but interesting enough for people to want to keep listening. He translated the Latin and asked questions so they'd have to think about the message. 

Aziraphale couldn't see any harm in a bit of translation. 

Father Petrus came round to study occasionally. He was a gentle, soft-spoken man who cared for his parishioners in a way that made Aziraphale's heart ache for them all. They were discussing the Letters of Saint Augustine Aziraphale had brought up from London when someone slammed into the door one night. 

Petrus smiled when he opened the door. “Hello, James, I'm glad you've finally decided to engage with the good word. How can we help?” 

Crowley shook his head, sharp and short, when Aziraphale mouthed _James?_ at him. 

“Yup, good word, great, love it, love to hear about it, always a fan, just wanted to chat to your friend about something.” 

“Friend?” Petrus smiled at his fellow cleric, “Are you happy to attend to this by yourself?” 

Aziraphale looked from Petrus to Crowley and back again. He was a little tempted to say no, the priest should stay – but Crowley was trying, sort of. He was wound as tightly as the rope in a well but was still refraining from active antagonism towards the idea of certain words being good. 

“Yes,” said Aziraphale slowly, “yes, it's fine. Thank you.” 

“Well then,” Petrus said, and picked up the Letters on his way out, “James, I hope we'll see you at church on Sunday. Aziraphale.” 

“Right,” said Crowley as soon as the door was shut against the inky darkness, “you're a healer, aren't you? You can heal stuff.” 

There were a few options for Aziraphale. He was fairly sure he was supposed to pick the one that went something along the lines of _get thee behind me_ , or maybe _I cast thee out_ , or something similarly familiar and renouncing. He could tease Crowley for the use of _healer_ instead of medic or physician, as if they were in a land (or an unland before land) a long time ago and far away. 

“I am. Who needs healing?” 

Crowley made the dramatic sort of frown, jaw clenched and eyebrows drawn, that he'd been using far more often since he commissioned his dark glasses a few centuries ago. The drama made his face far easier to read. 

“Me, obviously, unless you've got something better to be getting on with.” 

Generosity in battle was a virtue, wasn't it? Nobody had smote Saladin, so he must've been on to something. If Crowley needed a wound tended to – if he needed his hand held while he suffered through it – if he needed someone to mop his brow and murmur gentle words – well. Aziraphale was an angel. It was practically his duty. 

“Not at all. Where does it hurt?” 

Crowley squirmed ungracefully. He'd limped slightly on the way in, which suggested an injury to one of his legs; an adder bite would explain the embarrassment after centuries of claiming non-Irish serpents all had a crush on him. 

He mumbled something and pointed at his crotch. 

Catching the perilous burn would certainly explain the embarrassment too. Parliament had passed some law or other about it a few years back – that anyone with the unfortunate discharge would be kept in an infirmary until they were either cured or deemed to be no longer capable of spreading it about. No wonder Crowley had such strong opinions on infirmaries if that's what he'd been facing in London. 

It shouldn't have been a surprise. He was a demon. Of course he got up to that sort of thing. 

“Oh, really Crowley,” Aziraphale tutted, “if you need something dealt with in your, ah, Eve region, Mother Gytha down the way would be far better suited to helping.” 

“Oh yeah?” Crowley asked. “And what do you suppose good old Mother Gytha will say when she sees the teeth up there? Seems a bit _changeling_ if you ask me.”

“Teeth,” Aziraphale echoed flatly. What man would be sticking his quill in Crowley's ink-pot once he'd seen incisors there? Humans were often cowards about that sort of thing, although perhaps anyone brave enough to get intimate with a demon wouldn't be put off by the thought of blood loss. 

“Think one of them's chipped, or growing in strange, or something.” 

It felt wrong to ask Crowley to expose his intimates on the bench Aziraphale would usually use for practising medicine. The straw cushions on the floor, where Aziraphale sometimes placed men who'd hurt themselves in ways which made sitting difficult, also seemed too exposed. There was only one place left for treatment. 

The bed rustled slightly when Crowley sat down on it. Aziraphale followed closely after. He hadn't previously noticed before how very little room it had. 

“So what'll it be? Want me to split my legs like a new page?” 

Crowley stretched and bounced his words like that, drawing out vowels and dropping heavily on the consonants, when he was nervous. He wasn't the only one. Aziraphale had read plenty of books – just none in this particular genre. He knew it was one people enjoyed, and he knew the theory behind what made it enjoyable. There had just never been a book like this one which had compelled him to start reading. 

“Whatever's comfortable for you. As long as I can – that is to say, if you want me to take a look, you should – well. Whatever's comfortable.” 

Crowley grinned at that. Apparently Aziraphale's rambling was what made him comfortable. Comfortable enough to take off his glasses and stop swaying. 

“Are you getting all awkward, Father Aziraphale? Never taken a close look up someone's quoniam before?” 

“Oh, _really_ , Crowley – no, I haven't, if you must know. I've only seen the outsides before.” 

“You've only seen the – seriously? You've never, I don't know, helped out with a difficult birth?” 

“Well, no. It's not like you have, either.” 

“I have,” Crowley answered quietly. “You know I have. Remember? She didn't know what was going on.” 

Aziraphale didn't remember, but he had an inkling. Crowley had been fascinated, in the early days, by people in that sort of pain. The idea that the Almighty had condemned them to experience all creation as suffering – that the things they made would leave them bereft – it would be hard for a demon to understand. None of them had lost like that before. 

Crowley pulled his shoes off after a slight struggle and lay his head on the pillow. His hair was rose madder on the linen page; one of the inks they were told not to use too much of in case no more could be found. It radiated from him. 

“Would you like to pull your braies down?” 

They were grey rather than Crowley's usual black. It was probably easier to blend in if he looked slightly grubby instead of fabulously wealthy. His hands were still pale against them as he undid the strings and lifted his hips to slide them down. 

Aziraphale had seen Crowley naked before. Nothing so far had been a surprise. The soft hairs across his thighs; the wirier ones pointing down to his modesty; the dark folds peeking out where he split – none of it was more than he'd seen in a dozen pools and streams they'd shared. It was all just anatomy, no different to Crowley's slender shoulders or his fluttering eyelashes. 

Crowley had kept his tunic on. It made perfect sense while somehow emphasising how incredibly nude he was from the waist down. 

“Where does it hurt?” 

“Here, give me your hand.” 

There wasn't really any other way this situation was going to go. At some point, Aziraphale would have to touch where Crowley was hurting. He was a physician. Even if it was an unusual place for him to massage, he could do so in a professional capacity. It would be fine. There would be no way Crowley would notice the quickening pulse when he wrapped his delicate fingers around Aziraphale's broad wrist. 

Aziraphale glanced down. Perhaps it would be easier to look at the malady than to look at Crowley's face. Not that any malady was visible from the outside – there it looked no different to any other time he'd looked, although it was certainly a different angle. His sin had moved a quarter circle from greed to gluttony, and neither were appropriate to aim at a supplicant. 

“Are you sure?” Aziraphale asked. “You wouldn't rather someone else?” 

The words that were meant to follow refused to do so. It should have been a confession, or failing that, a rejection. Something to let Crowley know that there were feelings here which were less than medicinal. Or more than medicinal, a thirst for knowledge beyond words, the sort which could only be acquired through the other senses. 

Crowled rolled his eyes with a corner of his mouth turned up to communicate it wasn't entirely exasperated. “I'm not going downstairs to get this fixed. Either we do it here or, I don't know, I get a pair of pliers and do it myself. Probably what they'd do downstairs anyway.” 

“Absolutely not,” Aziraphale blurted out, aghast. “I'm sure we can heal it.”

They both knew that all he could be sure of was that he'd make a bloody good attempt, but that would have to do. 

Aziraphale put his hand close to the source of Crowley's woes. A candle flickered and sent shadows dancing over Crowley's hips while he waited for a nod. There was no way he could risk getting any of this wrong. If he made a mistake with one of the villagers, they'd still generally trust him. If he made a mistake with Crowley, they might not see each other for another century. 

Crowley was warm there, soft lips engorged with blood and heat. Aziraphale brushed them with just one finger, because it was worth taking things slowly here and seeing how his patient reacted. It was easy to part them ever so gently and press forward. 

“Sorry,” Aziraphale said when Crowley gasped, pulling his finger back as though Crowley were on fire, “did it hurt?” 

“No,” said Crowley. He shut his eyes and swallowed. Perhaps it had hurt just a little, but Aziraphale would allow Crowley to keep his pride. “No, you're fine. It's just – you're fine.” 

“Alright,” Aziraphale said quietly, “I'll continue, then.” 

He stroked gently upwards, finger only just inside the folds rather than up inside the passage, so that Crowley could relax enough that it would be no real imposition. 

“Are you ready?” 

Eyes still closed, Crowley nodded. 

It was easier this time to push up further into him until there were teeth. They were smaller than the ones in Crowley's mouth and ragged at the edges. Aziraphale concentrated on them and ignored the damp, soft heat up to his second knuckle. Pressing past the first circle, there was another one, and then another; a whole paragraph of teeth, holding his finger as gently as they could, undulating over his joints at the strange intrusion. 

“Are these new?” 

“Yeah,” Crowley replied through gritted teeth, “sort of. They – new ones, every century or so. Spend a few months with them coming in. This time's worse than most.” 

“Hmm,” Aziraphale agreed, turning his finger round, “and where's the one that's been giving you trouble?” 

Crowley reached down until his hand was on Aziraphale's. Using it like a yad, letting him read the language up inside himself which Aziraphale had known but hadn't practised in centuries, he put his fingers on the flesh of Aziraphale's thumb and turned it until it connected with the part that had been hurting so very much. Crowley gasped when it was poked. His eyes and his mouth both opened, splitting to reveal gold and pink, the black of his irises and the imperfect white of his teeth. 

The hurtful one didn't feel particularly inflamed or precarious. When pressed, the rest clenched down, causing Aziraphale to wince and Crowley's eyes to widen. 

“Fuck, angel, I didn't mean – you're not bleeding or anything are you?” 

Aziraphale could feel Crowley purposefully relaxing. He blushed pink with repentance and didn't complain when Aziraphale put his free hand around the trapped one for some leverage. Slowly, he pulled out the finger which had previously been nipped, and held it closely to his face to inspect. 

“No. No blood, just a little bit sore.” He gave a reassuring smile to the demon laying vulnerably across his blankets. “I think I've got just the ticket for that tricky little incisor, though.” 

If he'd held the finger by his face for longer than was necessary, utterly entranced by its dampness and the wild scent of it all, that was between him and his conscience. 

Aziraphale kept a number of medicines of various strengths on his shelf. Most were ones he'd collected on his travels, brought over from the continent or further afield in delicate glass bottles. Some worked because their owner was convinced they would, while others worked because things like opiates tended to work whether the patient believed in them or not. 

Aziraphale drew a dark brown bottle down from the shelf. He'd used this one on plenty of aches in the past. 

“Clove oil,” he said brightly, shaking the bottle in Crowley's direction. “Should help sooth the pain a little.” 

The oil warmed his finger when he rubbed it up and down with his other hand. It would do the same inside Crowley. The soft pink flesh around his sore little nub would hopefully be soothed by the heat and the numbness. 

“Remember,” Crowley asked, sounding almost dreamy, “when we were in that temple? And they had all those little bowls of clove oil. They were burning something, too.” 

“Some sort of hallucinogen, I think.” Aziraphale spread Crowley open with two fingers that were still clean. “It did smell nice though.” 

“So the clove oil's going to stop it hurting?” Crowley asked. The candle near his face had burnt low, making it much harder to tell whether he was wincing again. “Because I've got things to be getting on with. Demonic wiles and the like.” 

“You're a patient,” Aziraphale murmured, “so I'm going to help you, but if you could refrain from talking about your demonic wiles while I have a finger inside you, it would be much appreciated.” 

He was only at the first ring, so it wasn't too much of a bother when Crowley squeezed slightly. It reminded Aziraphale of a teething whelp trying out its very first weapon. He pursed his mouth slightly and Crowley grinned back. 

“Right. Got it. No wiling or mentions of wiles. Good words only, Father Aziraphale.” 

How would this look, Aziraphale wondered, if Petrus came back now? The wandering friar, doing what wandering friars were thought to do, but with a strange man in his bed instead of the miller's daughter. A redheaded man with devilish eyes who spoke with a Northumbrian voice but who they all knew came from London town. A man who wore his privates like Eve's and had done so for millennia. 

They might make the local chronicle. 

“There,” Aziraphale said, stroking the flesh around the sore part in tiny, delicate circles, “this should help. How does it feel?” 

He wanted to lean over Crowley and hold him as if it were safe. If they were human, perhaps they'd be able to find somewhere to write their own story. There were plenty of places where people like them could find happiness. Crowley could join the Church and they could be like brothers. Aziraphale could leave the Church and they could travel east. 

He wanted to lean over Crowley and hold him as if Crowley would ever consent to being held. 

“Mm,” said Crowley. He wriggled slightly. “Warm. Good.” 

“I'm glad,” Aziraphale said, before adding quietly, “it's rotten, being in pain. You should feel better.” 

Crowley laughed. It was loud and sharp. “Don't let Gabriel or your priest friend hear you say that. Demons deserve pain, don't you know.” 

“And do all demons get toothache in such an unlucky place?” 

“Nope. I mean, not that I've asked. But from what I've seen, everything here is unique.” 

“Yes,” said Aziraphale softly, “I should imagine you are.” 

The clove had spread from warm to numb. Aziraphale withdrew his finger reluctantly, touching as many little parts as possible on the way out. Crowley would be able to walk without limping – or at least, he'd only limp as much as he usually did, swaying and rambling about the place. 

“Nice,” said Crowley, putting a finger up in a gesture Aziraphale had last seen in Mile End which hadn't made its way past Hertford but which generally marked approval. “Feeling better.” 

He sat up with his knees to his chest and started to pull up his braies. Aziraphale turned away as if Crowley had any modesty left to protect. He crossed over to his table and picked up a quill which was almost ragged at the end from overuse, lifted the top from a pot of ink, and wrote in English: Clove oil. Apply to area of pain. There was a small length of string someone had given him around a chicken and he used it to wrap the label on the bottle, sealing it with an edge of wax that had dribbled down from one of the candles. 

“Here. For next time.” 

Crowley looked down at the bottle in Aziraphale's hand, then up at his face. 

“You're not going to need it for some other poor sap with toothache?” 

“I can always find some more.” 

The _more_ might involve a minor miracle, but that would sting far less than if the miracled oil were to end up on (or in) Crowley. Aziraphale watched as he picked up his glasses, closing off any expressions he didn't mean to show. 

“I'd've thought this sort of thing would be a secret. No point going to a healer if you can just get what you need in a little bottle.” 

“Well, it's not as if I'm running a pharmacy here,” Aziraphale replied. He was suddenly very aware that his hands still had traces of cloves and Crowley on them. He handed over the bottle. Their fingers kissed. “I just thought you might want it if you can't find me and it happens again.” 

“Yeah. Well.” Crowley put the bottle in his pocket as he stood up. “You're the one who knows what he's doing here.” 

Aziraphale didn't know much, but he knew more than most people in Pickworth. He had his texts and his memories. He had Crowley still in his hand, and would remember that late at night when he was by himself with only his books for company. 

He knew to let the devil in the woods go home.

**Author's Note:**

> Please don't put clove oil in, on or around your genitals. If you've got toothache, go to a dentist. If you've got pussyache, go to a gynaecologist.
> 
> While this wasn't written for a prompt, my thanks to everyone on the meme server who has put up with me asking questions about medieval dentistry for the past few weeks.


End file.
